During a Raging Gale, I Could Hear. This Defines Christmas in Gaza

The time was about 8:30 PM on a weekday evening when I made my way home in Gaza City. A strong wind was blowing, and I couldn’t stay out any longer, so walking was my only option. In the beginning, it was just a gentle sprinkle, but a short distance later the rain suddenly grew heavier. This was expected. I paused beside a tent, trying to warm my hands to fight off the chill. A young boy had positioned himself selling baked goods. We shared brief remarks as I waited, though he didn’t seem interested. I saw the cookies were hastily covered in plastic, already soggy from the drizzle, and I wondered if he’d find buyers before the night ended. The cold seeped into everything.

A Walk Through a Landscape of Tents

As I walked along al-Wehda Street in Gaza City, makeshift shelters crowded both sides of the road. No sounds of conversation came from inside them, merely the din of torrential rain and the moan of the wind. Quickening my pace, seeking escape from the rain, I activated my mobile phone's torch to light my way. My thoughts kept returning to those huddled within: How are they passing the time now? What are they thinking? What are they experiencing? It was bitterly cold. I imagined children nestled under soaked bedding, parents adjusting repeatedly to keep them warm.

As I unlocked the door to my apartment, the icy doorknob served as a understated yet stark reminder of the hardships endured across Gaza in these harsh winter conditions. I entered my apartment and was overwhelmed by the guilt of possessing shelter when countless others faced exposure to the storm.

The Night Worsens

As midnight passed, the storm intensified. Outside, plastic sheeting on broken panes whipped and strained, while tin roofing ripped free and fell with a clatter. Overriding the noise came the sharp, panicked screams of children, shattering the darkness. I felt totally incapable.

Over the past two weeks, the rain has been relentless. Freezing, pouring, and carried by strong winds, it has flooded makeshift homes, swamped refugee areas and turned open ground into mud. In other places, this might be called “bad weather”. In Gaza, it is experienced amidst exposure and abandonment.

The Cruelest Season

Residents refer to this time of year as al-Arba’iniya; the fourty most severe days of winter, starting from late December and continuing through the end of January. It is the real onset of winter, the moment when the season unleashes its intensity. Typically, it is faced with preparation and shelter. Currently, Gaza has no such defenses. The cold bites through homes, streets are empty and people merely survive.

But the threat posed by the cold is far from theoretical. On the Sunday morning before Christmas, rescue operations recovered the bodies of two children after the roof of a bombarded structure collapsed in northern Gaza, freeing five additional individuals, including a child and two women. Two people have not been found. These structural failures are not new attacks, but the result of homes compromised after months of bombardment and succumbing to winter rain. Not long ago, a young child in Khan Younis succumbed to exposure to the cold.

Precarious Existence

Walking past the camp nearest my home, I saw the consequences up close. Thin plastic sheets strained under the weight of water, mattresses floated and clothes were perpetually moist, always damp. Each step reinforced how fragile these shelters were and how close the rain and cold came to taking life and health for a vast population living in tents and overcrowded shelters.

The majority of these individuals have already been uprooted, many on multiple occasions. Homes are lost. Neighbourhoods leveled. Winter has arrived in Gaza, but shelter from its fury has not. It has come lacking adequate housing, with no power, devoid of warmth.

Students in the Storm

Being an educator in Gaza, this weather weighs heavily on me. My students are not distant names; they are young people I speak to; bright, resilient, but deeply weary. Most attend online classes from tents; others from overcrowded shelters where personal space doesn't exist and connectivity intermittent. Many of my students have already lost family members. Most have seen their houses destroyed. Yet they still try to study. Their resilience is extraordinary, but it should not be required in this way.

In Gaza, what would normally count as routine academic practices—projects, due dates—turn into ethical dilemmas, shaped each day by anxiety over students’ security, heat and proximity to protection.

When the storm rages, I am constantly preoccupied about them. Do they have dryness? Are they warm? Did the wind tear through their shelter as they attempted to rest? For those residing in apartments, or the shells that are left, there is a lack of heat. With electricity mostly absent and fuel in short supply, warmth comes mainly from wearing multiple layers and using the few bedding items available. Despite this, cold nights are excruciating. What, then those living in tents?

The Humanitarian Shortfall

Figures show that more than a million people in Gaza exist in makeshift accommodations. Humanitarian assistance, including thermal blankets, have been inadequate. Amid the last tempest, relief groups reported distributing tarpaulins, tents and bedding to a multitude of people. In reality, however, this assistance was frequently felt to be uneven and inadequate, limited to temporary solutions that did little against prolonged exposure to cold, wind and rain. Shelters fail. Respiratory illnesses, hypothermia, and infections linked to damp conditions are increasing.

This is not an unforeseen disaster. Winter comes every year. People in Gaza interpret this shortcoming not as misfortune, but as abandonment. People speak of how critical supplies are restricted or delayed, while attempts to fix broken houses are consistently hampered. Local initiatives have tried to improvise, to hand out tarps, yet they are still constrained by restrictions on imports. The culpability lies in political and humanitarian. Remedies are known, but are prevented from arriving.

An Unnecessary Pain

The factor that intensifies this hardship especially agonizing is how preventable it is. No individual ought to study, raise children, or fight illness standing surrounded by cold water inside a tent. No student should fear the rain ruining their last notebook. Rain exposes just how precarious existence is. It strains physiques worn down by pressure, weariness, and sorrow.

The current cold season occurs alongside the Christmas season that, for millions, represents warmth, refuge and care for the most vulnerable. In Palestine, that {symbolism